


Little Acts of Rebellion

by LunaCatriona



Series: The Abandoned Parties [1]
Category: The Thick of It (TV)
Genre: Christmas Party, Drunk Malcolm, Drunk Nicola, Drunken Shenanigans, Drunken silliness, Series 3
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-18
Updated: 2017-12-18
Packaged: 2019-02-16 18:57:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13060122
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LunaCatriona/pseuds/LunaCatriona
Summary: Rebellion isn't a crime. In fact, under the right circumstances, sometimes it can be an open door into something unforeseeable.Rated Mature purely for swearing.





	Little Acts of Rebellion

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome to my annual Christmas silliness!
> 
> This was actually inspired by an incident the other night while working with my brother; I was working at an office Christmas party being held in a hotel. Two guests who reportedly couldn't stand one another disappeared, and their colleagues panicked because the pair were drunk and both had tempers on them. What had actually happened was so much better than two drunk people fighting.

She didn’t know what possessed her to wear that dress.

It was simple. She had bought it before she fell pregnant with her youngest child, and had never worn it. In reality, it was probably a good five or six years out of fashion. But it was the prettiest thing she owned, and she had forgotten in the chaos of the department to go out and buy a dress for the Christmas party.

She almost hadn’t gone to that party at all. Her husband’s work party fell on the same night and he expected her to accompany him for the sake of their show. However, he had enlightened her with his attitude to ask one simple question: “Why the fuck, as a Cabinet minister, am I choosing to go with my husband to some corporate sleaze-fest with all his slimy mates, when I could be going to my own party?”

So she had put on her forest-green, knee-length dress and her pale high-heels, kissed her children goodnight, told the babysitter she could be lenient on the kids since the schools had broken up that day and the Friday to follow wasn’t a school day, and headed out the door. She hadn’t even told James she wasn’t going with him; she texted him when she reached her party that he was on his own. It was a rare act of rebellion.

At what stage she ended up dancing with the Foreign Secretary, she was not sure. The same was true for the dance she gave the Minister for Northern Ireland, the Defence Secretary and the Minister for Trade. She surmised that once she had let the Health Secretary anywhere near her with his fucking reputation, to give a dance to a slightly drunk Director of Communications was no big deal.

He fingered the sleeves of her dress where they sat below the shoulders. “That is one fucking nice dress,” he commented appreciatively.

The statement surprised her. Not once had that man ever paid her a sincere compliment. He preferred to call her mental, retarded and idiotic. What surprised her even more was that he had not complimented her with any sinister or sleazy undertones; he had genuinely been complimenting her dress. She hadn’t known he was capable of that.

There was something different about him when he was drunk, in an atmosphere like this. He seemed a more decent man, like all his brutality and hostility served a purpose greater than scaring ministers and civil servants into submission. He was a man as he danced with her, not the unhinged, borderline psychotic animal everyone in Westminster and Whitehall saw him to be.

That change stripped her of her reply to his compliment.

“Where’s your husband? I was hoping to get a glimpse of what a complete and utter cockwomble he is.”

She smiled slightly. She had no way of knowing whether that opinion was formed from the whole PFI mess or the general way her husband behaved – something which she never really tried to hide. “His party and mine clashed. At this late stage, I can only assume he’s drank half the whisky in Scotland and snorted half the cocaine in Colombia, and is currently getting on the nerves of one of his mates or some poor girl he’s been harassing all night,” she answered. Her own honesty astounded her. “I’d rather be here.”

To her amazement, he said, “Sorry.”

“What for? Not your fault I married a moron, is it?”

The song ended, but they did not part. She was too curious. Alcohol and festivity had robbed him of his usual demeanour, and her of her usual caution and anxiety.

Before she knew what the fucking hell she was doing, she was following him to the kitchen, giggling at his drunken idea of what it was to be stealthy – to look incredibly shifty and keep little control over his limbs. As a waitress left the room empty, he bounded in, pulling her by the hand. On the back counter was a huge number of varied bottles of wine. “Take your pick,” he grinned.

She shook her head in disbelief; how could she have never known he had this in him? Despite her misgivings about stealing alcohol, she picked up a bottle of wine. He did the same and pulled her again by the hand back out of the room. Was this his own little act of rebellion?

They ended up in a housekeeping cupboard; it was a tiny room – almost small enough to set off the claustrophobe in her, who was soothed only by the knowledge that the door remained unlocked – with shelves of white striped linen and cleaning products. She sat down on top of a vacuum cleaner called Henry, watching and laughing as he tried to find somewhere on the floor to sit where his long legs wouldn’t end up crushed. He leaned over and took her shoes off her feet while she opened her bottle. “They must fucking wreck your feet. I’ve never understood how women wear those things.”

“I’d say you get used to them but you’ve seen my work trainers,” she said.

“Those fucking bouncy castles,” he snorted. “Comfort’s the only reason to put that fucking monstrosity on your feet.”

She nudged his arm with her foot but laughed. “Just ‘cause you get to wear clothes you’re comfortable in. That’s the difference between men and women, you know. We’re judged on our fucking looks first and what’s in our heads second!”

He smirked as he uncorked his bottle of wine. “I’d agree, apart from the fucking gaping hole in your theory.”

“Which is?”

“There’s nothing in your fucking head.” She chucked her cork at him; it bounced off his temple and rolled across the bare floorboards. “Ow! Fuck’s sake, Nicola!”

She threw her head back laughing, and let out a high-pitched squeak as her balance wavered on top of Henry. That only made him laugh, though he still rubbed his temple gingerly. She drank from her wine bottle and tried not to let the alcohol into her nose. She held on to the post of the linen rack when she found she could not rid herself of the giggles. A striped duvet cover fell off the shelf and onto his head, which served to do no more than make her laugh harder.

He pulled her by the leg and she fell off Henry with a thud onto her arse, wine splashing up into her face. She was fairly sure she might find a bruise in the morning.

When they finally composed themselves, she moved to sit next to him. “What the fuck are we doing in here, Malcolm?” she asked, taking a swig of wine.

“Hiding,” he whispered conspiratorially.

“From whom?” she hissed back.

“Fucking everyone,” he said. “I can’t be doing with them. My limit’s about an hour and a half. I learnt that a fucking long time ago.”

She frowned. “But why take me with you?”

He took a drink and paused for a moment before he gave his answer. “You might be enough to fucking drive a saint to murder,” he said, “but you’re a fucking human being. More than can be said for that lot through there.”

She could tell he didn’t want to say any more on the matter, so took the duvet cover he had put on his lap and spread it over them like a blanket. He pulled her side back. “What are you doing?!” she protested.

He tilted his head. “You’ve got a scar on your knee.”

She rolled her eyes at his observation, wondering why it mattered to him at all. “I cut myself shaving when I was fifteen. Bath looked like somebody had been fucking murdered,” she recalled her own clumsiness. “Do you know what the most ridiculous thing was?”

“What?”

“I shouted for my dad, not my mum. My mum used to vomit at the sight of blood, and there was a fucking _lot_ of blood. She has haemophobia.”

He sniggered. “You’re a fucking family of phobias.” When his smile faded, he asked, “What started the claustrophobia?”

She hesitated. That was not information she usually gave. But when she looked into his face, she saw that, for once, he just wanted to know her better. There was no trace of a plan or a scheme in his eyes, and no indication that he would ridicule her. “When I was in Year 5, one of my classmates locked me in a stationary cupboard for a dare. They didn’t find me for four hours. About a month later, my uncle was in hospital and we went to see him. We took the lift to the fifth floor and I had a fucking meltdown. That was that. Nicola the Claustrophobe.”

“Why aren’t you freaking out just now?”

“The door’s unlocked,” she said simply. “I know I can get out.”

She half-expected him, the sadist he was, to get up and lock the door. But he didn’t. She recalled his original reaction to hearing her claustrophobia was largely about not being able to find a way out of a space – to tell her she was fucking mental. Now, under the influence of alcohol and calm, he accepted that was just the way she was. It probably helped that she had told him how the problem started, too.

In the silence, she looked around at him. “What made you…well… _you_?”

He smirked, though she could not possibly know why. “It’s just the way I am.”

Either he was telling the truth and there was no real reason for his ways, or he was lying and simply didn’t want to speak about it. That was something she had to respect. She didn’t press him for an answer, but she did say something else. “Do you know what I’ve learned?” she asked.

“No, but I’m sure you’ll fucking tell me.”

She smiled and leaned a little closer to him. “Those hardest to love need it most.”

He laughed out loud. “That’s fucking profound, that is!” he chuckled. “Let me never forget that fucking statement came out your mouth!”

It was a strange thing, to watch him laugh without derision or sarcasm. It was pure and innocent, and everything she knew he wasn’t. But when he stopped laughing, a look appeared upon his face that told her she was right about what she had said to him. “I wasn’t fucking joking, you know.”

“I know,” he answered. “That’s what makes it all the more fucking astounding that you said it.”

His smile was not one she had seen him wear before. It was full of amusement and contemplation, and the lack of the wall that usually surrounded him. It seemed she had managed to get to him. He took another mouthful from his wine bottle. “God knows I need it,” she sighed, mirroring him as she drank. “And I know I’m not easy to love. Christ, I’m not easy to even like, never mind love.”

“You’re not that bad.”

She gazed at him in surprise, waiting for him to elaborate.

“You’re thick as shit sometimes,” he acknowledged, “and there’s cocker spaniels out there with more fucking common sense. But you’re a good person. And sometimes – just sometimes – what’s in your heart is more important than what’s in your head.”

“You never even tried to deny you’re hard to love,” she noted, trying not to let his words bounce around in her head. “You didn’t dispute it.”

“Because I know it’s fucking true,” he said. “I wouldn’t fucking love me.”

A shot of sadness hit her at his admission; he wasn’t a monster. The fact she was perfectly comfortable sitting drunk in a housekeeping cupboard was a testament to that. He wasn’t good. He wasn’t evil, either. He floated somewhere in between, just as the rest of humanity did. It just so happened that his malign moments were louder than his benign ones, and so that was what the world thought of when they heard his name.

She rested her chin on his shoulder and searched his face for some evidence that she was right or wrong about him. “You’re steaming,” he grinned. “Nic’la, you’re fucking pished.”

She could only smile back and reply, “You’re not fucking far behind me.”

Why he did it, she never did find out. He kissed her. The greater mystery was why she – a married woman with four children – didn’t stop him. In fact, she kissed him back. When he broke away, she said, “You know this can’t happen, don’t you?”

He put an arm around her and guzzled from his wine bottle. “I know.”

“Malcolm?”

“Hmm?”

“We’re drunk in a housekeeping cupboard,” she giggled.

“As always, Nicola, your powers of observation are fucking unearthly,” he retorted.

It wasn’t long before she succumbed to the warmth of his body and the weight of linen across her legs; the next thing she remembered was waking him up and telling him it was midnight and they had to go.

* * *

 

The next morning, she walked into DoSAC for the last day of work before everything stopped for Christmas and New Year. She had the world’s worst hangover and her husband wasn’t speaking to her, but it was worth it for the night she had. At least, that was her outlook until she saw the photograph pinned onto her office door. There it was for everyone to see – the Secretary of State for Social Affairs and Citizenship asleep (well, passed out drunk) with the Prime Minister’s Director of Communications.

She looked around her; everyone was deliberately averting her gaze, and she knew it was so that she couldn’t see their stifled laughter. It didn’t work at all.

She pulled the photo down, sure that everyone had seen it and that it probably had been emailed to half the Parliament by now. But when she sat down at her desk, she looked down at the picture with a smile. She couldn’t bring herself to be annoyed by the circulation of the photograph, because she could not regret ending up there.

Their little acts of rebellion were the best things they’d done all year.


End file.
